[user9430961]

I have a 2015 Scion xB automatic with 9,310 miles. I live in Los Angeles, and I work close to home (less than 10 miles one way to work). I bought my car brand new in September of 2015, and I am roughly driving about 665 miles per month. I usually spend about 6 hours per week in freeway stop-and-go morning AND evening rush hour traffic.

About 500 miles ago, I noticed that my brakes started sporadically lightly squeaking anytime I had driven 20 or more minutes (on both street and freeway driving).

Upon taking my car in the Toyota dealer for the 10K mile service last week, they stated that I have 70% available wear on my front brakes and 85% available wear on my rear brakes. They said that my rotors are glazed and that they will soon start to warp. They said that this squeaking problem has occurred due to my applying/riding my brakes too much and the rotors and brakes keep heating up, thus causing the squeaking. They said that they could replace the rotors for about $250 to stop the squeaking, but I declined, as I was not ready to start paying $250 every time that I hit about 9K miles. While at the dealer, they did rotate all 4 tires (as part of the 10K mile service), but now I have noticed that after driving for about 20 or more minutes, my brakes are squeaking louder AND squeak about every 2nd and 3rd time I hit my brakes.

I have been driving since 1979 (in Los Angeles traffic). I have always drove a brand new car (6 cars between 1979 and 2015) and keeping each car until the car had at least 100K miles before getting a new car, and I have never once had a squeaking brake problem before where the brakes and or rotors needed to be fixed or replaced “BEFORE” hitting at least 30K miles . . . even if I replaced the brakes and or rotors at 30K miles, I still could easily drive my car at least 30K more miles before having any type of brake issues. I have owned Nissan, Ford, and Chrysler cars in the past and have never had any squeaking brake issues on any of them where the brakes and or rotors had less than 30K miles on them.

I do not drive this xB any differently than the previous cars I have had over the past 37 years, so I am at a loss on how I can fix this problem. With the constantly high volume of stop-and-go traffic I have to deal with in Los Angeles on a very frequent basis, I admit that I “DO” have to brake a lot.

Since I am driving a relatively brand new car, could this be a Toyota manufacturer defect? I was going to try to live with the light sporadic squeaking until I could feel the rotors warp (by the feeling when braking over time) OR try to make it to 30K miles before doing anything, but since I got the tires rotated last week, the problem is now much worse.

Any thoughts or suggestions or fixes . . . short of stop driving after 20 minutes or getting new rotors every 9K miles or buying a different non-Toyota car?

 

[HATEnFATE]

You can always contact the customer assist line with Toyota and see if you can get a resolution that way. Usually you can get some kind of help especially since the car has less then 10K. There should be some kind of resolution that Toyota might offer.

The other option would be to upgrade the brakes with better parts. I'd try another set of OE replacement rotors(aftermarket, but of good quality)and you could check around to see if you can get a pad made with a different compound. You could try a set of organic pads and see if they help. Wagner Thermo-quiet pads always seemed to do very well.

If you're still having a problem, you might have a bad caliper that is dragging the pads on your rotors....

 

[user9430961]

You can always contact the customer assist line with Toyota and see if you can get a resolution that way. Usually you can get some kind of help especially since the car has less then 10K. There should be some kind of resolution that Toyota might offer.

The other option would be to upgrade the brakes with better parts. I'd try another set of OE replacement rotors(aftermarket, but of good quality)and you could check around to see if you can get a pad made with a different compound. You could try a set of organic pads and see if they help. Wagner Thermo-quiet pads always seemed to do very well.

If you're still having a problem, you might have a bad caliper that is dragging the pads on your rotors....

HATEnFATE, thank you for your help. As near as I could figure, upon talking to the service technician, the type of wear-and-tear they found on my brakes was not covered under the warranty. Thus is why they wanted to charge me the $250 to fix the problem. As it seemed that he was not willing to fix the problem under the existing warranty. Yet if they did fix the problem under the warranty, I figure more than likely, I would be back in the exact same situation 9K miles later.

Yet I am going to take your advice, and look into doing the upgrade to better parts . . . or at least an upgrade to better brakes for right now. Again, since I have never had this problem before on any other car I have owned, I figure that Toyota must have used cheap brakes on the xB. Which maddens me, since I thought I was buying a quality vehicle through-and-through. Yet since the rotors aren’t warped as of yet, I might be able to save them and do the upgrade to better brakes.

Thanks so much for your help and suggestion to upgrade, because I am sure with your advice, I have saved my rotors.

 

[Zembonez]

Something doesn't sound right here.

My 09 XB has 85K on it and only recently needed its first set of new front pads (about 72K of city/highway mix). Rotors are original and never have warped, although I did have them lightly machined for the new pads.

Try another dealer. Their quality of service certainly does vary.

 

[HATEnFATE]

I don't see why a Dealer wouldn't try to at least "goodwill" a set of brakes at 10k. Thats unusually low....The sad part is that Scion Surveys never meant anything to the dealers and their CSI scores, so turning down a repair was never really as big of an issue.

I agree with Bonez, maybe try another dealer to see whats going on before you dump a bunch of your own money into the repairs??

 

[user9430961]

Thank you Zembonez, I may try another dealer, yet I am sure that since the service advisor put on my service record that I declined the suggested $250 brake/rotor service (that I am sure went into the Toyota main database, since that decline was listed on my service receipt), so I figure that any Toyota dealer will probably be able to pull up (in their database) every service record created any time I took my car to a Toyota dealer. Yet if all else fails, I will have my trusted mechanic (that I had used for years before buying my xB), take a look at the brakes and then go from there.

Thanks again for your help Zembonez, and HATEnFATE.

 

[HATEnFATE]

You didn't decline a "one time" warranty repair option, you declined "paying" for a service that you weren't sure of, and one that could quite frankly, possibly be a warrantable issue.

First, call Toyota's customer care, then seek another dealer.